Afraid of No Man or Their Money, Obama Takes Down The Koch Brothers

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Charles and David Koch may own the Republican Party, but during his speech on the ACA, President Obama showed today that he owns the Kochs.

Video of the full speech:

Transcript:

THE PRESIDENT: Look, part of the reason I need your help to make this law work is because there are so many people out there working to make it fail. One of the biggest newspapers in the country recently published an editorial I thought was pretty good. They said, the Republicans in Congress are poisoning Obamacare, then trying to claim it’s sick. (Laughter.) That’s exactly what’s been happening.

I mean, they have tried to put up every conceivable roadblock. They cut funding for efforts to educate people about what’s in the law. Some of them said if their constituents called them, we won’t even try to explain to them what’s in the law. They actually opened up an investigation into people who try to help churches and charities understand how to help people sign up for the law.

Some of the tea party’s biggest donors — some of the wealthiest men in America — are funding a cynical ad campaign trying to convince young people not to buy health care at all. I mean, think about it. These are billionaires several times over. You know they’ve got good health care.

AUDIENCE: Right! (Applause.)

THE PRESIDENT: But they are actually spending money on television, trying to convince young people that if you’ve got the choice between getting affordable health care or going without health care, you should choose not having any health care. Now, do you think if you get sick or you get hurt, and you get stuck with a massive bill, these same folks, they’re going to help you out?

AUDIENCE: No!

THE PRESIDENT: Are they going to pay for your health care?

AUDIENCE: No!

THE PRESIDENT: It is interesting, though, how over the last couple years, the Republican Party has just spun itself up around this issue. And the fact is the Republicans’ biggest fear at this point is not that the Affordable Care Act will fail. What they’re worried about is it’s going to succeed. (Applause.) I mean, think about it. If it was as bad as they said it was going to be, then they could just go ahead and let it happen and then everybody would hate it so much, and then everybody would vote to repeal it, and that would be the end of it.

While Republican shudder at the very thought of crossing the Koch brothers, the president called out their efforts to deceive people into not signing up for affordable health insurance. Other politicians are afraid of the Koch brothers, but Obama isn’t. The Koch brothers spent more money trying to beat Obama in 2012 than John McCain raised in 2008. All told, the Kochs spent $400 million of their own money trying to beat the president. The result of their spending wasn’t just failure. didn’t just fail. It was a spectacular humiliation as President Obama won in a rout.

Obama has stared down the barrel of the Koch money machine, and won.

The Koch brothers are spending millions of dollars on television ad campaigns that are spreading lies about Obamacare. The great irony of this is that the Koch brothers have fantastic health care. They will never have to worry about being able to afford the care they need. Yet, these same billionaires are trying to convince uninsured people who need health insurance not to get access to healthcare. If the uninsured get sick, the Koch brothers aren’t going to pay for their care. Their answer is to force the uninsured to go to the emergency room, and pass the bill on to everyone else who does have health insurance.

Charles and David Koch have billions of dollars. They can buy lots of television ads, but the one thing that they can’t do is stop or defeat the President of the United States. The Kochs may own the Republican Party, but Obama owns the Kochs.

Jason Easley

Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.

Awards and  Professional Memberships

Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association